Any time Spicely (10-1 MMA, 2-1 UFC) has tapped someone out, it’s been in the first frame. And that continued on Saturday when he caught Di Chirico (10-2 MMA, 1-2 UFC) in a triangle choke, forcing the tap at the 2:14 mark.

The middleweight bout was part of the preliminary card of today’s UFC on FOX 23 event at Pepsi Center in Denver. It aired on FS1 following additional prelims on UFC Fight Pass and ahead of a main card on FOX.

Related

Forty-five seconds in, the fighters tied up along the fence and the Tristar Gym-trained Spicely put American Top Team’s Di Chirico to the fence. But Di Chirico adjusted and put Spicely on his back. That worked to Spicely’s advantage, though.

Spicely got his legs up and worked for a triangle choke. He worked elbows from his back to soften up Di Chirico’s head. And with one of Di Chirico’s arms trapped, he finally saw no point to continue fighting. With the choke tight and not going anyway, Di Chirico had to tap.

He then used his opportunity to call out four-time Olympic judoka Dan Kelly, who is 5-1 in the UFC.

“I train at Tristar MMA with the best guys in the world,” Spicely said after the fight. “When you’re at a gym that high of caliber, you get real calm, real fast, and you get real confident in yourself. Going up there really helped me believe in myself, and I feel great. (The choke) was pretty tight. I just readjusted, shoulder-walked, and I knew I had him. I was patient.

“I’m a nice guy, but there’s one guy out there I can’t stand and that’s ‘Judo’ Dan Kelly. I don’t know how he does it, but he gets in here and keeps doing it and it’s the ugliest, sloppiest stuff I’ve ever seen. Dan, you’ve got to walk that broken old body down and you’ve got to face me, man.”

The win gave Spicely six submission wins in his 10 career victories. Spicely won for the second straight time after losing his UFC debut in July 2016. Di Chirico is back in the loss column after picking up his first UFC win this past August.